Hard times spark interest in New Deal sites

AP Photo/Vicki Smith

A spinning wheel and a basket of hand-loomed rugs are on display in a museum in Arthurdale, W.Va., that was part of Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt’s original New Deal communities, on Dec. 2, 2008. Weaving was among the skills the planned communities taught impoverished West Virginians in the 1930’s as they tried to become self-sufficient after the Great Depression.